


Ball Pit Battle

by rebelmeg



Series: Rebelmeg's Tony Stark Bingo Fills 2019 [11]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Avengers Family, Competition, Fluff and Humor, Gen, Hijinks & Shenanigans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-09
Updated: 2019-04-09
Packaged: 2020-01-07 14:27:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18412511
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rebelmeg/pseuds/rebelmeg
Summary: This is one civil war that won't end in blood and tears.  Well... hopefully.  Ball pits can be a dangerous place.Written first of all as a fic for my poor sickie friend, Trashcanakin!  And secondly, for the TSB, square R5 - asking for trouble.





	Ball Pit Battle

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Trashcanakin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trashcanakin/gifts).



> Ball pits, dodge ball, and a sick Trashy mean that I gotta write a fic!

Steve hesitated. “I’m not sure this is a good idea.”

Natasha patted his shoulder comfortingly. “It’ll be fine.”

“But splitting apart like this, facing each other from opposite sides?”

Clint shrugged. “Worse things have happened.”

“What other choice do we have?” This from Thor.

Bruce raised his hand. “I want it on the record that I think this is a bad idea.”

“No more arguing.” Tony stepped forward and faced off against Steve, his face set in grim determination. “Are you in or are you out?”

Steve’s jaw clenched, clear disapproval on his face, but he finally replied, “So be it.”

With a bright grin, Tony turned around and pointed a finger straight at Bucky. “You.”

“Aw, c’mon!” Steve complained, whining as Bucky smirked and headed for Tony’s side.

“Gotta break up the dream team.” Tony said in a sing-song voice, looking utterly unrepentant. 

Steve glowered as he mumbled mutinously. “I should pick Rhodey.”

“Go for it, Capsicle, I dare you.”

Steve opened his mouth, clearly intending to do just that, but then clearly thought better of it at the last second. “Natasha.”

Tony nodded, “That’s a wise choice. Honeybear, get up here.”

Natasha and Rhodey took their sides, then Steve paused, clearly deliberating as he looked between Sam and Thor. 

“Um… Sam.”

Clint started cackling as Sam joined their team, which honestly made everyone feel a little bit wary.

“All right, Thunder Thighs, you’re mine!” Tony crowed happily. “Use that height to your advantage, big guy.”

Bruce, who had deliberately opted not to join a team, stood between Tony and Steve and looked amused, if slightly apprehensive, at the proceedings.

“Okay, ground rules.” Steve now had his fists on his hips and his Captain America voice out, the very image of authority and power.

Or, well, he would have been had he not been standing in front of a ball pit the size of an Olympic swimming pool.

The other Avengers were already looking at the pit, not paying very much attention as they worked out strategies and positions, but Steve wouldn’t let that deter him. “Rule number one—”

“There aren’t any rules.” Natasha darted forward, and even with his superhuman reflexes, Steve still went toppling over backwards into the ball pit as Natasha shoved him, then jumped right over his head and did a cannonball right into the deep end of the pit.

At that point, all hell broke loose.

Clint (who was wearing a hat with a shark fin on it, because Clint), dove after Natasha with a wild whoop, flailing as he sank down through the surface of the plastic balls. 

Bucky, who obviously preferred to be slightly more stealthy, slid in at the closest edge and promptly disappeared, with Sam following right behind him. That was probably going to end badly.

Tony and Rhodey had gone gunning for the shallow end like it had been choreographed, their long years of getting into shenanigans together working in their favor. They had both scooped up a ball, which they pinged off Clint’s forehead the second he broke the surface, his shark fin giving his position away. The two were clearly intent on racking up a high score for their team, as every hit counted as one point and they were already up to seven between them, with another hit to Clint and one for each of the other members of Cap's team.

Steve had obviously given up any hope of trying to moderate this disaster, and leaped into the deep end with his limbs starfished out, hitting the surface in a belly flop that certainly sounded painful, but he just giggled like a kid and wiggled his way down.

Thor was embracing this human custom with every bit of exuberance he had in his body, flinging balls left and right, breaching the surface like a whale before crashing back down again, laughing and shouting war cries every time.

Bruce had taken up residence on the side of the pit, his legs dangling down to kick the brightly colored balls around as he watched everyone else, idly tossing a ball here and there. He hadn’t been sure about getting all the way in, given how crazy and competitive the team got when they did stuff like this, so he was taking it slowly. It was hard to tell, as he sat there, if he was plotting out a strategy, or merely watching for the fun of it.

The air rang with shouts, screams of rage, threats, and boisterous laughter as mayhem rolled out in the ball pit. Tony had built the floor around the pit on a slight downward grade, so any balls that were pitched out of the pit rolled their way back in on their own. (He’d also retrofitted a Roomba to chase after any balls that got stuck, for no reason other than he could, and it whizzed around as fast as it could go, chasing balls back into the pit.) 

Natasha and Bucky were both utilizing their skills at stealth as former assassins, sneaking around the ball pit without a trace until they popped up out of nowhere with a perfectly aimed ball or two. Bruce nearly laughed himself sick when they popped up in front of him at the same time and got each other right in the face, swearing in Russian before pelting Bruce in the chest with balls and disappearing back under the surface.

Thor and Steve weren’t bothering to be stealthy at all, instead employing an all-out brawl strategy that had waves of plastic balls cascading towards members of the opposite teams.

Tony and Rhodey were having great success as they moved slowly around the shallow end, scooping up balls and proving they both had great aim, even from a distance.

Clint and Sam, however, were very suspiciously absent. The teams were up to ninety-six points collectively when it became obvious where the two of them had disappeared to. Clint’s shark fin hat made an appearance, then he and Sam resurfaced about twenty feet apart, balls clutched in their hands. 

It only took less than fifteen seconds for one of them to be targeted, and Bucky surged up to the surface with a ball in each hand right in front of Sam. He threw both balls just as Sam threw his, but instead of Sam’s ball bouncing off and falling to join the hundreds of thousands of others… it exploded in Bucky’s face.

Bucky looked ready to commit murder as he blinked shook his wet hair out of his face. “WHO HID WATER BALLOONS IN HERE?!”

Given the way Sam was laughing so hard he might have a stroke, stumbling over to and clinging to Clint to keep himself from falling over, it wasn’t hard to guess.

With a snarl, Bucky took off after the two of them, and despite the chaos, it was pretty easy to track the progress of all three of them in the huge pit (shark fin hat notwithstanding). 

Another two minutes, and another twist was added to the war.

Thor came shooting out the end of the slide positioned in one corner of the deep end with a roar of laughter, the balls in his hands catching both Steve and Nat before he disappeared back into the pit under a shower of displaced balls.

“Hey, I thought we said no slide!” Natasha protested, flinging not just balls, but water balloons at Tony and Rhodey, who were doing their best (and failing) to block or dodge them. She had clearly found the stash that Clint and Sam had hidden.

“You said no rules!” Bruce reminded her, an enormous grin on his face as he stood in the pit nearer the shallow end, balls up to his waist as he gathered up an armful and sent them raining down all over the place.

It was clearly time for Natasha to up her game.

“Steve!” Natasha yelled, moving through the balls toward him as fast as she could go.

That was all the warning he got, and he turned around just as she launched herself out of the pit and swung herself around Steve’s torso with her thighs, climbing up on his shoulders with an impressive twist of her torso.

“Hand me ammo!”

Steve began tossing balls up to Natasha with one hand and throwing them with the other as fast as he could go, the two of them making a formidable team.

Tony’s jaw dropped as he saw them, then a look of determination crossed his face. 

“Thor, catch me! Rhodey, you’ve got my six!”

Rhodey took his job seriously, trailing after Tony as he shuffled to the edge, hauled himself out of the pit, then ran around to Thor and literally jumped into his arms. Pointing a finger at Steve and Natasha as he clambered up on the demigod’s shoulders, he yelled, “Attack!”

Between Rhodey covering their six, Thor charging all over the ball pit without tiring at all, and Tony flinging balls as fast as Thor could pass them up to him, they were racking up points at quite a clip.

Steve and Natasha were holding their own though, especially once Clint and Sam started throwing water balloons again, and passing more up to Steve and Natasha.

It was time for drastic measures, and only one of Tony’s team was still MIA. But not for long.

Bucky came out of the pit like a missile, and he caught Steve around the waist, taking him down. Natasha shrieked as she was unceremoniously dumped back into the pit of balls, and took it out on Tony, who was laughing so hard up on Thor’s shoulders that he was crying.

Face dripping from the water balloon Natasha had launched at him, Tony let himself topple off Thor’s shoulders, still laughing. It was a minute or two until he recovered, red-faced and wet, and he sounded like he was having the time of his life when he hollered, “Rhodey! It’s time to bust out the secret weapons!”

With an expression of utter glee on his face, Rhodey scrambled back to the shallow end, dug around for a second, then pulled out two brightly colored ball launcher guns. Throwing one to Tony, he loaded up and started firing balls as fast as he could, moving in sync with Tony so that one was firing as the other loaded up.

Bucky and Steve were having an all-out wrestling match, scattering balls everywhere as they shouted and swore and laughed. Thor had picked Sam up around the waist, turned him upside down, and was spinning in a circle while Sam’s entire upper torso and head were dragged in circles through the balls. Natasha and Clint were on opposite sides of where the end of the slide extended over the ball pit, pelting balls at each other so fast they were nearly a blur. And Bruce walked around the edges of the pit, picking up displaced balls that were rolling back towards the pit, tossing them at whoever was closest.

JARVIS called time a couple minutes later, just as Steve had flopped backwards, landing on Bucky who had been holding onto him like a jet pack, Sam had yanked Thor’s leg out from under him, Natasha had climbed on top of the slide and tackled Clint, and Tony and Rhodey both broke their ball-shooters and were obviously considering throwing them.

“Before we have any bloodshed, I will call this wild fracas to an end.”

Tony hauled himself up on his elbows from where he’d flopped down into the pit on his back. “Score?”

“Am I to count any balls that were sent airborne, or just the ones that were deliberately thrown?”

Tony raised his eyebrow at Steve over in the deep end, where only his head was visible and he was panting and grinning next to Bucky.

“All of them!”

“Total balls thrown: 1, 263. Balls that hit someone after being sent airborne for any reason, 1,947. And here are your individual scores.”

JARIVS projected the scores for them all to see.

Tony started laughing like a hyena when he saw his name on the top, Natasha four balls shy, Steve three behind her, and Rhodey only five below him.

“I WIN! BAHAHAHA, TAKE THAT CAP!”

“You threw the most, but MY TEAM GOT THE HIGH SCORE!”

It dissolved into arguing after that, Clint and Sam taking extreme offense that their water balloons didn’t count (they were the two lowest scorers other than Bruce), but the balls shot out of Tony and Rhodey’s guns did, Natasha looking so smug that Bucky tried to give her a noogie, and Tony and Steve were locked in a near-shouting match as they bragged obnoxiously at each other.

Thor, Rhodey, and Bruce trailed behind the rest of them, shaking their heads at the antics of their fellow Avengers.

“A very worthwhile sport,” Thor said with a nod. “I can see why it is popular in this realm.”

“Well, it’s mostly popular with little kids. But you try getting an idea out of Tony’s head once he latches onto it.”

Bruce sent Rhodey a raised eyebrow. “You were the one that suggested it.”

Rhodey just grinned. “I sure did. You guys hungry?”

Thor was always hungry, and Bruce’s metabolism made it so that he could always eat, and by the time all nine of them all filed into the communal living room and sprawled out on the huge sectional and the floor, pizza had been ordered.

As Bruce and Sam passed out cold water bottles from the fridge to everyone, Clint swiped the shark fin hat off his head and fanned his face with it.

“I demand a water balloon rematch.”

“Not unless we do it outside,” Tony interjected. "If we do it anywhere inside, bad things will happen.”

“Aw, Tony, but it’s cold outside!”

“How about the covered pool?” Natasha suggested, swiping the water bottle that Thor had just been given right out of his hands.

“That works.” Tony pulled up his schedule on his phone. “Next Thursday?”

“No teams next time,” Bruce put in, handing water bottles to Bucky and Thor (again). “It’s funner sometimes.”

“ _Funner_ isn’t a word, where did you get your doctorates, Brucie-bear?”

“It should be a word.” Bruce threw his water bottle cap at Tony. “And none of those doctorates were for English.”

Kicking his feet up on top of the coffee table, Bucky shifted down against the couch cushions and motioned for JARVIS to turn on the TV. “I wanna watch Band of Brothers.”

Tony groaned and flopped down sideways, sprawling over Rhodey and Natasha’s laps. “You and Capsicle always pick the dumb war shows.”

“It’s history, Tony. Appreciate it.”

Tony just snorted and flicked his bottle cap at Bucky, who caught it easily. “Fine, but I get to pick the next one.”

“Nope.” Natasha bopped him on the nose. “You picked Real Housewives last time and lost your turn.”

“I’m _sorry_ , I forgot I knew some of them.” Tony griped, swatting her away.

“Pretty sure I’d have been a much more stable human being without your overly sexual commentary about it.” Sam put in, sitting on the floor and using Clint’s forehead as a drink rest.

Rhodey slapped a hand over Tony’s mouth before he could bring a rebuttal. “Shut up. Show’s starting.”

Tony pouted, but quieted down anyway, and the rest of the day was spent watching TV and eating pizza.

At least, until Clint disappeared for a little while and came back with the rest of his water balloons…


End file.
